Not only can it help you grow your mobile food business… if you use it correctly. If you think your account could use some clean up and/or tender loving care, check out our quick tips to improve your presence on the Instagram platform.

5 Ways To Improve Your Food Truck Instagram Account

Use photos of more than food

If you’re running your food truck kitchen properly your food looks great, and you want to show it off to customers. But if picture after picture simply showcases plates full of food, there is a good chance your customers will end up getting bored. It’s important to take pictures of things other than food. Consider posting pictures of your staff members, your truck’s awesome wrap, promotions, and more. This will show your personality and makes your feed a lot more interesting.

Ask questions

Just like any other social media platform, it’s important to engage your customers and encourage them to share. One way you can do this is by asking questions and getting your customers to post their photos. You could ask customers to share images of them eating your food, or something as random as a picture of something they wish you had on your menu. This will get your followers involved in more than looking at your photos.

Don’t use crappy photos

Of course, this should go without saying, but it’s extra important: make sure your photos showcase your food truck’s brand. Poor food photos won’t get you more followers or encourage anyone to track down your truck to wait in line for something that looks unappetizing. You don’t necessarily have to hire a professional photographer, but you do need to make sure your truck and your food look great.

Use hashtags

Never forget about the power of the hashtag. Just like they work on Twitter and more recently on Facebook, hashtags can help your customers find you. For example, let’s say your food truck is based in Phoenix. By hashtagging your photo with #Phoenix or #PHX, anyone searching for that tag (including potential customers) will come across your photos.

Offer deals

Hey here’s an interesting twist…promotions! Give your current and prospective customers a reason to follow you. Sharing photos is great, but make sure your customers are also getting something. A recent trend I’ve noticed is trucks that share photos of their new promotions or share discount codes. If customers know they’ll be the first to find out about new deals, they’ll be more likely to follow you.

Instagram can be a great way to build business and increase sales, but only if you use it right! By using this guide, you can improve your food truck’s Instagram account immediately.

If you have any food truck Instagram account tips you’d like to share, please feel free to add them to the comment section below.

Richard is an architect by degree (Lawrence Technological University, Southfield, Michigan) who began his career in real estate development and architectural planning. In September of 2010 he created Mobile Cuisine Magazine to fill an information void he found when he began researching how to start a mobile hotdog cart in Chicago. Richard found that there was no central repository of mobile street food information anywhere on the internet, and with that, the idea for MCM was born.